Considering that this was the least prolific season of his career, playing basically at a "marginal/arguable All-Star" level and that he still received a comparable number of votes with elite All-Stars and MVP candidates tells me that he was easily among the very most popular players in the league. Even more so if you consider that lots of people were asking Vince Carter to surrender to him the A.S starter role, despite having got more votes (then, why the heck were they voting for Carter more?).